Missed Moments
January 25, 2010
These are the photos that I’ve taken for “This will not happen again” project assigned by the photography course that I’m taking. It occurred to me that every photograph, every captured moment is a moment that will not happen again for it is unique. I came up with the idea that when something spontaneous happens and in panic you can not get a decent shot of it, the moment is missed forever and it is impossible to capture it ever again. Therefore I’ve named this series “Moments Missed”. During the process of taking these photos, I’ve realized that it was actually harder to shoot shitty photos with the feeling of “missed moments” rather than shooting decent photos. The one with the fake christmas tree is my favorite.
Photography: Elliott Erwitt
March 20, 2009
I fell in love with the work of Elliott Erwitt, a Magnum photographer. I am burning up with jealousy because I have a “thing” for absurd, ironic and spontaneous photos in black&white. His photography combines all of what I’m passionate for and makes me feel sorry to have been born in 1989.
BIOGRAPHY
Elliott Erwitt
(American, born France, 1928 – )
“It’s about reacting to what you see, hopefully without preconception. You can find pictures anywhere. It’s simply a matter of noticing things and organizing them. You just have to care about what’s around you and have a concern with humanity and the human comedy.” -Elliott Erwitt
Born in Paris in 1928 to Russian parents, Erwitt spent his childhood in Milan. Then emigrated to the US with his family in 1939. As a teenager living in Hollywood, he developed an interest in photography and worked in a commercial darkroom before experimenting with photography at Los Angeles City College. In 1948 he moved to New York and exchanged janitorial work for film classes at the New School for Social Research.
Erwitt traveled in France and Italy in 1949 with his trusty Rolleiflex camera. In 1951 he was drafted for military service and undertook various photographic duties while serving in a unit of the Army Signal Corps in Germany and France.
In 1953 Erwitt joined Magnum Photos and worked as a freelance in that golden period for illustrated magazines. His personal work has been published in countless monographs. His photographs are collected and exhibited in museums around the world. To this day he is for hire and continues to work for a variety of journalistic and commercial outfits.
In the late 1960s Erwitt served as Magnum’s president for three years. He then turned to film: in the 1970s he produced several noted documentaries and in the 1980s eighteen comedy films.
Erwitt became known for benevolent irony, and for a humanistic sensibility traditional to the spirit of Magnum. With a touch of humor and an eye for the humane, his black and white photographs reveal the most basic and candid human emotions. He developed his vision during the post-war rise of documentary photojournalism, and has captured many of life’s most poignant ironies through an amusing vernacular.
Sources:
http://www.magnumphotos.com/Archive/C.aspx?VP=XSpecific_MAG.Biography_VPage&AID=2K7O3R13AKIJ
http://www.kochgallery.com/artists/contemporary/Erwitt/
